Red Spring
by lostlikeme
Summary: Will calls a crisis prevention center during his first heat. Hannibal helps him cope. Warning for explicit content and Alpha/Beta/Omega dynamics.


Two hours before the rest of the kids get out of school, Will slips into the kitchen through the back door. It smells like cookies but doesn't feel like home, and in the short distance from the fridge to the stairs Will finds himself winded.

The entire house is empty, save for the windchime on the porch. Will doesn't have any friends, but this is the kind of realization he can't even bring himself to tell the social worker.

Inside his room Will sequesters himself into a corner with the cordless phone. He glances over his shoulder to ease his mind, before producing a scrap of paper from his pocket. He scribbled the information down from one of the computers at school, knowing even then that he probably needed it.

Will pulls away once to make sure he's dialed the right number, and once to make sure he isn't crying. He stares at the photograph of his foster parents before placing the frame face down on the bedside table. Three consecutive rings are interrupted by a punctuated silence.

"I want to die," Will chokes into the receiver.

"Then you've come to the right place," a deep voice answers him. "This is your local crisis prevention center, Hannibal speaking."

Will's heartbeat is in his throat. Hearing the words out loud unleashes a landslide of emotional backlash. He chews on his lip until his mouth tastes like copper. The space fills with his disjointed breathing.

"Is that your real name?" Somehow, the detail feels important.

"It is." Will can hear the chair squeak when Hannibal leans back. "Want to tell me yours?"

Will glances to the window and then his closed bedroom door. A moment passes that feels like forever. "...is that allowed?" he asks, hesitantly.

Hannibal's tone remains neutral. "If you'd like."

Answering feels unavoidable, though Will comes close to hanging up before giving in. "My name is Will."

Hannibal's voice is even and pleasant; relaxing. "Why do you want to die, Will?"

He stares at the eggshell stucco and sees faces in the paint while he thinks about it. That very question burned a hole in his head long before his biology ever rebelled against him.

"Everything hurts," Will concedes weakly.

He clutches his flannel shirt, too distracted to undo the buttons properly. There has always been a deep anguish buried in his heart. The kind of pain where screaming overshadows the tearshed. Now, Will can feel it like a physical manifestation that never was-a phantom limb.

"That sounds unpleasant," Hannibal acknowledges. His voice broadcasts a suggestibility Will has never felt privy to. "However pain and suffering also yields the strongest souls."

Will frowns, focusing on the birds outside the window. "Then my soul must be an impenetrable force."

"I believe it," Hannibal says, while Will is still trying to discern his motive. "Where is your family?"

Will tries to steady his voice but it's no good. "I don't have a family."

"Everyone comes from somewhere," Hannibal says, and although he doesn't demand it Will feels compelled to respond.

"And some kids go nowhere slow!" Will snaps, but the effect is lost when his voice cracks. "This family isn't real," he mutters with a shake of his head. Tears well in his eyes and the truth comes pouring out of him. "Nobody adopts a kid this old, and I'm sick of being lied to about it. I know everyone is just waiting for me to age out."

"How unfortunate." Hannibal pauses. "And this is this your first heat as well?"

"How did you know-" Will's knuckles turn white and the phone shakes in his hand. He feels undeniably drawn back to the sensation of his body and the damp, sticky feeling of his underwear. "I never asked for this."

"No one asks to be born." Will can hear a condescending smile in the lilt of his voice. "We are brought into the world without our consent."

Will curls into himself on the carpet, tears leaking over the bridge of his nose. He feels unworthy. Navigating high school is hard enough without a soup of submissive pheromones permeating his skin.

"Where are you?"

The concern makes him feel more cared about than Will could ever admit. Will rolls his shoulders, inching under the metal frame while Hannibal talks to him.

"Under my bed."

Enclosed spaces have always felt safer, which makes sense now more than ever. Animals are always drawn to Will too, and at his last foster home he used to help in the garden. He's still trying to discern which traits are his own and which are in his nature when Hannibal speaks up.

"And how old are you?"

Will sucks in a breath. "I'm still in high school."

After this he won't ever be able to come back. They'll have to transfer him to a segregated group home where he won't be a distraction to his peers.

Hannibal's voice softens. "Are you frightened?"

There are indents from his nails when Will retracts his fingers. "I'm not scared-I'm disgusting."

Will picks at the seam of his pants, listening to his own heartbeat. His fingers are trembling from the cold but he's sweating through his shirt. He's squeezed himself into the far corner, his right shoulder brushes the wall.

"Because you have a biological craving to be mounted?"

Will chews on his thumb and grinds his hips into the floor. The urge to sob becomes overwhelming. This is the opposite of what he wanted. He covers his mouth so Hannibal can't hear him struggling to breathe.

"Are you that afraid of succumbing to your instincts?"

"I'm not scared!" Will lies. "I just don't want to be controlled-I want to be me."

"I understand your concern," Hannibal says. The validation helps take the edge off. "But is all change loss? What if this is a piece of yourself that was always missing?"

Will's lips become a thin line as he clutches the bedpost in one hand. "You're saying becoming an omega will make me feel complete?"

The correction is gentle. "I'm saying that it's possible."

Will finally manages to slip the first button through the loop, before quickly moving onto the rest. He shrugs out of his school shirt and gasps at the friction between the floor and his chest. The tremors pass in waves, starting in his fingers and ending at the tips of his toes. Will pulls at his uniform pants, knees locked together.

"No one can force you to bow to your true nature, Will," Hannibal reminds him. The sound of his name on Hannibal's tongue sends a shiver straight to his cock. "But this much cognitive dissonance can't be comfortable."

"It's…" Will rolls his hips into the carpet. "It's not."

His nerves feel on the edge of combustion and he can't stop fantasizing about fetching Hannibal tea. "Everything feels…" Will exhales as long as he can. "I don't know what to do."

"Well that depends," Hannibal says easily. "Do you want to kill yourself before or after you come?" Will's breath catches and his wrist stutters to a halt. "Answer me, Will."

Something inside him seizes and contracts at the sound of a command. He squeezes himself without meaning to and shudders.

"After," he admits. "Please," he adds, hastily, though he has no reason to.

Will wants to ask if he's normal but he can't bring himself to actually say those words out loud.

"Touching yourself without permission is rude," Hannibal informs him. Will can't speak, breath held as he listens intently. "If I were there," Hannibal lowers his voice to a whisper. "I would eat you alive."

"Can I-" Will falters.

"You can do anything you please. Under the condition that you describe it to me."

Will struggles to free himself from his underwear, trembling when his palm reaches his cock. The contact sears his skin. "I'm, uh," he considers lying but decides against it. "Jerking myself off." His voice wobbles.

When Hannibal tells him, "Good boy," his cock jumps in his hand.

"Don't be mad," Will begs, eyes shut to hide from his own shame. "I'm really close."

His cock is slick and hot in his fist, and all Will can think about is Hannibal dragging him out from under the bed and fucking him over it.

"From thinking about taking my knot," Hannibal supplies.

The declaration clarifies what had just been stipulation. Will shakes his head in a rush, imagining being stretched wide and pumped full by the man on the phone he's never met before in person.

"Yes," Will stutters as he strokes himself off. His muscles lock one at a time as he teeters closer to the edge. "Inside me."

"Come out from under the bed," Hannibal says gently. Will shakes his head again though Hannibal can't see him. "Try it. If you don't feel better you can go right back under."

There is a line of light where the edge of the bed ends. If Will looks up he can see the wooden box spring, twenty-five years old, at least. His wrist hurts from the awkward position, too. Will knows Hannibal is right, feeling fit to burst as he dangles off every word.

"Trust me, Will. I hate to repeat myself."

The wallpaper becomes a blur when Will closes his eyes. The world tips beneath him and his stomach twists as he inches out from underneath the bed. The air is cooler and easier to breathe. Will rolls onto his back, chest heaving. He holds the phone to his ear with one hand and his cock in the other.

"Make up your mind, Will," Hannibal begins. "Do you want to die or do you want to come?"

"You were right," Will breathes deeply. "I don't want to die," Will confesses. "I'm going to-please, please…can I-"

"Go ahead Will. Next time it will be my hand, with my cock inside you."

Will drops the phone to fist himself in both hands, hips thrusting forward. Hannibal's voice fades in and out from beside his ear.

"I cannot wait to see how you taste."

Will ejaculates against his belly, fever hot and ready for more. He wipes semen against his thigh and turns his head to face his cellphone.

"I don't know what you look like," Will complains when he finally catches his breath.

"Don't worry," Hannibal reassures him. "You will."


End file.
